Printable Reference Guides

Since there are no real official Heroes 5 reference manual — and we understand that Alt-Tabbing is not an option for many older hardware configurations — we decided to provide you some printable reference manuals. Of course, they won't be as graphical, as detailed, and obviously as interactive, as our pages here can be. But we hope they will be an up-to-date reference you can rely on while playing.

We will start this section with skills reference manuals, which are described below. Depending on your feedback and interest, we are prepared to add more. Of course, we will listen to your feedback to make them better suited to your needs.

Note to webmasters: if you're a webmaster and want to link to our printable documents, you are welcome to link to this page. That will make sure your visitors get the latest version of the guides as we update them. Direct linking to the pdf files is forbidden.

How to ...print the booklet? ...view PDF files?

How to print the booklet as a booklet?

» Step 1 - Print them: To print those booklets, we recommend using your printer driver, which often has such an option. To do that, select your printer in the Print dialog and click on the "Properties" button — usually just right to the printer selector. A dialog box should open, displaying your driver options. Look for a booklet option somewhere (you can use the forum link above to ask for help). Result should be 2-up, 2-sided, with pages automatically reordered.

» Step 2 - Fold them: Once the sheets are printed, there should be 2 pages on the front, and 2 pages on the back of each sheet, allowing to fold them as a booklet (printed). Check the pages order by using the page numbers at the bottom, and fold them with care. For example, the cover sheet of the Skill List should have page 12 and 1 on one side, and page 2 and 11 on the other.

» Step 3 - Staple them: To grant your booklet a longer lifetime and a more professional look, you can add 2 staples on the fold. As I don't have a good stapler — that could be opened wide to staple in the middle of a page, I do that by hand (stapling): take a staple, place one hand below the sheets and force with the other. Take care not to hurt yourself, and to insert it from the outside of the booklet to the inside (result).

How to view PDF files?

Download and install Adobe Reader, the free PDF viewer, using the link on the right. You can also go in the "Extras\Adobe\" folder of your Heroes 5 CD/DVD, where you'll find the Adobe Reader installer for both Win2k and WinXP (7.07 en-US on my DVD).

Heroes Reference Manuals

The Heroes List [3.71Mb] contains all the heroes, including the campaign ones, with 6 heroes per page (2 pages per faction). Starting hero skills of the heroes are listed, as well as possible spells and war machines.

The document contains less information than the heroes section of the complete manual, but is intended to be shorter (12 pages instead of 36).

Game version: 1.2

Creatures Reference Manuals

The Creature List is available in High-Res version, with creature icons and colors, and in Low-Res black&white version without icons. Of course, the first is more enjoyable, and you should go for it if you have a color printer (see how the result look, printed on an HP PSC 1610).

The Creature List [1.24Mb] displays all the creatures stats, in handy faction tables, allowing quick glance comparision. You'll find all the information you're used to on AoH, except for the descriptions and comments.

Skills Reference Manuals

There are two complementary documents available for skills: a skill list and the faction skill cards. Again, our main motivation here was not to stun you with beautiful graphics or icons, but to create lightweight, easy-to-print booklets.

The Skill List contains all the skills and abilities, with descriptions and requirements for the various factions. They are listed by skills, alphabetically sorted.

The Faction Skill Cards are focused on the 6 factions. Each Card contains a tree view of the available skills and abilities for that faction. Abilities required for the faction "absolute ability" are underlined. Keep in mind also that Advanced level in a skill is required to learn a second ability in that skill, and Expert level to learn a third.

Thanks to sfidanza for the work on this page, and for making the reference guides.Thanks to Eric Stickland for the original work on the creature list.Thanks to ThE_HyDrA for creating and looking after the Heroes 5 section of Age of Heroes!